Lambkin's Remains

The acute eye of friendship and sympathy, coupled with the instincts of a scholar and a gentleman, perceived my irritation, and in the evening Lambkin uttered the memorable words that I have quoted. I thanked him warmly, but, if long acquaintance had taught him my character, so had it taught me his. I knew the reticence and modesty of my colleague, the almost morbid fear that vanity (a vice which he detested) might be imputed to him on account of the exceptional gifts which he could not entirely ignore or hide; and I was certain that the phrase which he constructed to heal my wound was not without some reference to his own unmerited obscurity.